Truman Capote’s Hamptons Home for Sale

Currently for sale for $15 million, Truman Capote’s Hamptons home offers a glimpse into the life of one of the last century’s most enigmatic gay figures. Capote lived in the four acre Hamptons estate for the last 23 years of his life and it is where he completed "In Cold Blood."

Four buildings dot the property including an ocean view main house, two-bedroom guesthouse, 1,900-square-foot artist’s studio, detached garage and swimming pool. The main house interior is 3,500-square-feet with four bedrooms and four baths. Restoration and expansions have been made by current artist owner, Ross Bleckner.

Author of two immediately recognizable classics, "In Cold Blood" and "Breakfast at Tiffany’s," Truman was born in 1924 and was submitting stories for publication at the early age of fifteen. He was a driven writer motivated to live in his imagination to escape continuous reminders of his parents’ rejection and being sent away to live with his mother’s distant cousins. His life was made lonelier by his undisguised homosexuality, a constant bone of contention with his mother.

It was during his childhood in the South when he met Harper Lee who authored "To Kill a Mockingbird." Theirs was a lifelong friendship and it was Lee who later accompanied Capote to Kansas to assist in his research on the murders that would become his most famous work, "In Cold Blood."

The success of this non-fiction novel made it possible for Capote to achieve the social status he had always craved. The Black and White Ball he held at the Grand Ballroom at the New York City Plaza Hotel for society’s upper crust to celebrate the publication, is still talked about today and recreated in major cities around the country each year. Members of this group became his new friends and he moved contentedly in their circles until authoring "Answered Prayers," a collection of stories with thinly veiled, easily recognized characters, that told too many of the elite’s secrets.

"Answered Prayers" outraged his new friends and Capote became an overnight outcast of society. Completely distraught after having lost his hard-earned social status, Capote turned to alcoholism and drugs. He was rarely seen in public after that although he did make a number of appearances on the "Johnny Carson Show." Carson’s ex-wife, Joanne Carson, was with Capote during his last days and his death in 1984.

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